Tag Archives: writer

Creative Space (blog post 12 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell
‘In the Mind of Gaudi’ Anadol immersive experience at Casa Batllo

One of the biggest challenges you may encounter when trying to write, is finding the head space to write and feel creative. This post is to reassure you that it’s okay to have this frustration. I’ve definitely been feeling this way lately, but I’m trying to just let myself do the things I need to do just now, and know I’ll get back on track soon.

I used to think free time was the problem, but often my free time needs to consist of  decompressing and switching off and this will take priority over sitting at a laptop (or notebook) for hours, carving out a story. When I’ve been sitting at a laptop all day in work, filling my head with other peoples’ words and problems, reading through what can be an average of thirty emails a day, making constant calls, taking calls, typing notes…I often need to just take a step back and give my brain some silence. Over the past few weeks we’ve had a bit of a mini heatwave in Scotland, and I feel like this is so rare I would also be silly not to take advantage of being outdoors as much as possible.

This isn’t to say I’ve not been thinking about ideas. I have, and continue to research a new project I’m working on, often scribbling or typing up notes. But I just haven’t formed anything into a coherent order or structured story in a way I’m happy with.

A weeks ago I downloaded a great book onto my kindle called ‘We Need Your Art’ (see here to buy) by a writer I follow on Instagram called Aime McNee. Reading this on my commute to work helped me feel like I was carving out some time to acknowledge the need to keep connected to my creativity. At the heart of Aime’s book is giving importance to your art, and an encouragement to share your work. The book has echoes of The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron and Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, (and in fact references both), but I loved the honest and accessible way this one is written. Throughout the pages there is a continuous mantra to be confident, stay motivated, and don’t give up, no matter what obstacles you might face along the way. I wanted to read the whole book through before going back to try the re-set exercises. I’m going to set aside one of my lovely new notebooks to try the re-set challenge soon.

Another non-fiction book I’ve been enjoying delving into on my commute is a gift from a creative friend. It’s called Daily Rituals: Women at Work by Mason Currey, and documents the daily routines of well-known female ‘creatives’~ writers, painters, composers, singers, filmmakers. I’m half-way through the book and the majority of the artists mentioned dedicated most of their day to their creative practice – sometimes a solid 12 hour plus day of being immersed in a world of art. I don’t think I would want that either. So how do you find the balance?

When my husband asked me the other day, what helps you get into a writing state of mind? I had a proper think about this. When I write my best work it’s when I have switched into what I call an unconscious kind of flow state; I don’t think about writing or what I’m trying to achieve, I just let  the words flow. A bit like what he was doing when he was driving. A bit like what happens if you’re playing the piano and don’t need to look at the notes or concentrate – you let the music take over. Listening to music can also help me get into this state of mind; particularly if an album starts to become the ‘soundtrack’ of the book I’m writing as it’s then a helpful way to allow my mind to shift into that world again, and enter a certain ‘mood’ I am trying to evoke within the story.

At the moment I feel like I am in my conscious state of needing to feed my creativity, and what Cameron refers to in The Artist’s Way as ‘filling the creative well’. I’ve had weekends surrounding myself with beautiful scenery, walking beside the water, eating good food, buying little trinkets and art from gorgeous independent shops. I’ve been on an amazing trip to Barcelona soaking up the artistic genius of Gaudi, admiring his spectacular architecture, visiting the Moco Museum and viewing a range of inspiring exhibitions (one of my favourites was standing inside Studio Irma’s Diamond Matrix – an installation of hundreds of light-up diamonds); taking photographs of beautiful street art and buildings, and buying pottery and prints from local artists to take home to decorate my writing room.

One of my favourite parts on a visit to Gaudi’s Casa Batllo was a sensory immersive art experience called ‘In the Mind of Gaudi’ where I stood inside a 6 sided LED cube room, inaugurated by the artist Refik Anadol. This is one example where AI can be used positively to enhance a creative structure, as it enabled Casa Batllo to collect millions of Gaudi’s photos, videos, drawings, 3D models and so on, in order to create a large digital library of his patterns and design logic, which Anadol then used to project visual images. It truly was like we were standing inside Gaudi’s mind, with a succession of images flowing around the ceilings, floors and walls, accompanied by dreamy music akin to Sigur Ross. It gave me goosebumps, and reminded me that a world without art would be a very dull place. In the Moco Museum this quote from the founders, Kim & Lionel Logchies, can be found at various points: “We use the power of art to challenge the norm, champion the truth, open up minds, and question the world around us.”

I believe one of the biggest ways you can feed your own creativity, is to immerse yourself in the creativity of others. So if you’re feeling a little unproductive in your own work, and your brain is tired, then try and seek out some art in your local area- visit an art gallery or museum, go to the cinema, visit some quirky independent shops selling inspiring products, people watch at a café, read good books, watch a thought-provoking documentary, spend time with other creatives…

Take a break from the screen, and go and fill your head with daydreams

Submission Stories # Part 2 (blog post 10 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell

This post is about the Journey of Book 2: Promise Me. You can buy my books here.

I’ve tried to strike a balance in this post, of being completely transparent, but not too negative, as ultimately I’m writing these posts to encourage anyone reading to keep going, and to not give up, whichever direction you decide to go with your writing.

When my debut Follow Me was released in 2015 I knew my publisher was interested in reading my next stand-alone, Promise Me.  I was now doing talks and creative workshops in schools and the community, chatting to librarians and slowly building ‘an audience’. Reviews were also starting to come in for Follow Me, and teenagers talked to me about the book at events. (I also got interviewed for Teen Titles magazine at one school).

For the first time in my writing life I was suddenly acutely aware of who might read my new book when it was released, and what their expectations might be. This put a low-level pressure on my creativity; something I had never really experienced before.

I was also trying to juggle the events, (always feeling I was never doing enough compared to other writers I was connected to on social media), whilst working full time. I stupidly went for a promotion at my day job (and got it), all before Promise Me was done and dusted. But it was a time in my life where I felt super-motivated and had more energy (I was younger!!), and the excitement of having a ‘book out’ always spurred me on.

When I had nearly finished my first draft of Promise Me I entered it into the SAW Pitlochry and won second place. The crime writer who adjudicated told me she could imagine her teenage daughter really enjoying having a teen sleuth at the centre of trying to solve the mystery of a crime that had already occurred. I felt this was a good selling point too, and it kept me motivated to get the book finished. I signed the contract for publication in 2017.

Fast-forward two years, copy edits done, release dates promised, then passed, with no response, and so began a repeat cycle. In amongst this a lovely librarian offered to launch Promise Me in her community library in a local area where I had done several events; another librarian wanted to book me for her new festival which would tie in to local schools to promote the release of the book. My publisher knew all of this, and still silence.

I never feel comfortable going into detail about this in a public forum, but needless to say, this was a not a great time for my creative confidence (especially when I genuinely did not know how to explain to the librarians, or to anyone, what was happening, as I had no idea what was happening!).

Every time I heard the question, ‘When’s your next book coming out?’, deep down I felt like a failure.  

I realise now that the people who persistently asked this question hadn’t even read my first book, and had no intention of buying my next one, but the amount of pressure and frustration I felt at the time was immense.

My advice: ignore the external pressures, unless it’s from someone who is involved in bringing your next book to life, and they’re actually nudging out of necessity, or to give you encouragement

The thought of going back out on submission filled me with dread (as the average time of your book seeing the light of day after acceptance, never mind how long it takes to get there, can usually be around 2 years) But I knew I had hit a brick wall with the current situation.

So, at the end of 2019 I took the rights back for Promise Me. I was also in the middle of writing my new YA thriller (Young Blood).

I started to send out Promise Me again to select agents (I was being fussy), but mostly got rejections, or no response. Then I noticed a new publisher was running an open submissions competition for Young Adult novels. I scoured the rules and realised it was open for published writers, as long as you didn’t have an Agent. (Most big competitions like Chicken House and Bath Novel etc. are only open for unpublished writers– see the end of the post for links to these).  

The publisher was professional and dynamic, and making waves, so I excitedly sent off my work.

Fast forward a few months later I received an email to let me know I’d made the long list. The day I moved into my new house in 2020 I received an email from the editor saying I had made the final seven. It was a massive boost. I didn’t win, but the editor had a chat with me and said the book sellers and librarians on the judging panel were very positive about my book. She also offered me some really helpful editorial feedback.

At this point some writers in my network were taking control back, and independently publishing their work. I had watched my Mum do this to a high standard, and she kept saying it was another option I could try.

Not long after this, I entered a call-out for a Zoom pitch event with a big agency. I was selected by the agent to have a chat.

Weirdly she recognised my name as she had been copied in to one of the emails relating to the acquisitions meeting for Follow Me at ‘the big publisher’ I mentioned in my last post. (She was an editor with them at the time).

The agent was really enthusiastic about Promise Me, said she loved the first few chapters and premise, and asked me to send through the full manuscript.

A few months went by with no emails, so I sent a polite ‘nudge’. I received an apology, saying she was behind in reading. I appreciated the update.

Then another six months went by, so I sent another polite email. And never received a response.

To this day, I never did get a response.

I totally understand that agents are busy people. Plenty of agents have ignored me during ‘cold submissions’ which is fine, because most will clearly state on their website, if you have not heard from us in X amount of weeks, we’re not interested.

But when you’ve had a full manuscript request, and a face-to-face chat (it was on Zoom because we were still in semi-lockdown), I think it’s rude to leave someone hanging.

At the time I wish I had used this website called Query Tracker see here You can sign up for free and it provides information on pitching to agents, but also people leave feedback on response times and reply rates from agents they’ve subbed to. The aforementioned agent now runs her own agency, and interestingly lots of people have posted on this site with the exact same experience as me; ghosted after full requests following on from personal contact during pitch events.

During lockdown when life slowed down, it gave me proper time to reflect on what I actually wanted from my writing career. I asked one of my career guidance friends to give me a coaching interview, and this helped me unpick my motivations and priorities.

She asked me an important question: What was stopping me from taking control myself, and independently publishing?

I realised the biggest thing stopping me was fear of perceived external judgement. Who does she think she is….Clearly she’s not good enough if she has to do this herself… We’re not interested in self-published books at this bookshop. But when I unpicked this further I realised none of my worries related to my actual readers. These thoughts related to other writers I knew, random people in my life…mostly ones who had never even read my first book, or cared about it enough to support any attempts at promotion, and gatekeepers (like bookshops *I’ll focus a bit more on the gatekeeper aspect in my next post*).

Returning to the point that the folk who usually ask the most demanding and nosey questions about my writing life (and probably yours), …How many books have you sold? Why’s your next one not out yet?  Are you not quitting your day job yet? Why aren’t you in a window display or the Buy one Get one free in Waterstones? Are you not speaking at X book festival?

..are usually the ones who haven’t even read my work, and are never going to buy my books, even if I get a 5 figure book deal and it’s optioned for film...

In fact those people would probably be the first to ask: How much did you get for your film deal?

I want to point out here that I don’t mind being asked questions about my writing at all, if the intention is good. And I 100% don’t expect everyone in my life to champion my work!  It just made me realise, I shouldn’t care so much about what people think about me and my work, definitely not to the point of stopping me exploring new ways of getting my book out there.

A few months later, I bit the bullet and started the process of Independently publishing Promise Me. It had already gone through many professional copy-edits, I’d received further editorial feedback after the open submissions competition, and I was very fortunate that my Mum is great at editing, and is a genius when it comes to all of the technical support needed to format and publish.

I had already dabbled in releasing a short story collection, and my designer friend Dainty Dora (see site here) aka Rebecca,  supported with a great cover design for this, so I enlisted Rebecca’s support again for the cover of Promise Me.

Promise Me was released into the world in October 2021 and I went with wider distribution, meaning it’s fully available everywhere. I hosted an online launch on release day through Facebook which generated enough sales to put my sales ranking on Amazon alongside big sellers like Holly Jackson. (If you like A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder you might like my books, just sayin’) Those kind of figures are fleeting, but it gave me a huge boost on the day to know people were interested enough to buy my new book.

A screenshot of Promise Me in the Top Ten – glad I captured this moment

A librarian friend also invited me to take part in an online group workshop for a teen writing group, and last Spring I was part of the Paisley book festival schools programme, with Promise Me promoted and bought into libraries. During another school event not long after publication, a highlight was seeing teachers sitting reading my book when I arrived to the class for the session, telling me how much they were enjoying it. Last year an English teacher in a school I’m connected to in my day job said that Promise Me is never on the school library shelves and she often sees pupils reading it. After such a long up-and-down road with this book, every single moment like that means so much to me.

Next time I’ll post a bit more about my experiences of Independent Publishing.

In the meantime, I hope this post hasn’t put you off trying the traditional route, as it’s something I know I will attempt again (due to some of the cons that come with Independent Publishing).

If you’re unpublished and have a novel ready to send I recommend trying one of these big competitions which are closing soon

Chicken House Books Competition – for Children/YA books– closing 2nd June

Bath Novel Award – for both Young Adult and General (adult) fiction Closing 31st May

Bridport Prize – General Novel – Closing 31st May

Keep an eye out on Mslexia Competitions – they have run both General novel and Children’s/YA in the past

Happy Writing!

Submission Stories #Part 1 (blog post 9 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell

In these posts I’m moving more into a personal ‘behind the scenes look’ at my submission experiences for my three Young Adult books. I’ll do a post for each book. I’m doing these posts because I love to read about other author’s journeys. I find it motivates me and makes me feel less alone in what is quite a mad creative world. Also for all three books I’ve had very different experiences, which resulted in me taking more personal control.

Prior to ‘Book 1’ there were other books, but I refer to them as my practice novels. I completed my first typed ‘novel’ (as opposed to the many, let’s call them ‘novellas’, I had written in jotters) when I was about thirteen, and received my first rejection from a major publisher.  I wrote a magic realism contemporary novel in my early twenties and sent this out to a few publishers and one agent. I randomly met the agent’s assistant at an event and he said he pulled my book out of the slush pile and enjoyed it. (The agent making the decisions, didn’t). Years later I bumped into him at another event and he asked what happened to it. I am sure you are thinking I should have persisted with this one. But I felt I could write better, and by that point I had started to focus more on writing Young Adult, because most of the ideas that were forming in my head seemed to lend themselves better to having teen protagonists. So here’s some highlights of my submission journey with my debut Young Adult novel, which eventually did reach publication back in 2015.

Book 1 – Follow Me

When I first started writing Follow Me something took over. It was the first time a book seemed to take on a life of its own and perhaps because I was living alone at the time, once I had established a basic plot, characters, and written my prologue (which set the tone and gave my protagonist a ‘voice’), every time I sat down I was able to immerse myself fully in the world.

A couple of people who read Follow Me talked about the ‘hypnotic’ characters and feeling like the writing contained some kind of undefinable ‘magic’. I mention this, not to ‘big up’ my book (though I will always have a soft spot for this story), but because it aligns to how I felt early on when ideas and chapters unfolded. I could feel the magic driving this one, and I knew deep down this was going to be ‘the one’; the book I was going to get published, because it was the first time I properly felt like I knew what I was doing structurally, and was excited by the story and characters. Also, something in my mindset had changed. I had started to send out short stories, and was reaching publication, and being placed in competitions. I was starting to believe I could be a ‘serious writer’.

When I had nearly finished my first draft I submitted the book to the TC Farries competition at the Scottish Association of Writer’s conference and won first place.

A well-established children’s author was the adjudicator, and said it contained the ‘magic’ needed to captivate a YA audience. This gave me the confidence to finish it, fine tune my manuscript and start subbing to agents. Colleagues at the time discovered print-outs of my first few chapters and their excitement at reading, and wanting to continue reading (along with my Mum’s encouragement, and another writing friend) all kept me going…

And then when I started to sub to agents I got emails from about three asking very quickly to read the full manuscript. I was on tenterhooks waiting for replies as you can imagine.  But then the rejections started coming in.

Here’s a snapshot of some rejections.

Unfortunately, the premise involving twins is too similar to another title on our list. We wish you the best of luck with placing your work.

Many thanks for sending me your submission, which I read with interest. I’m afraid, however, that I didn’t feel passionately enough about it to offer you representation. You write well, but I’ve just taken on a book which deals with teen suicide so this feels too close to it for me. Our business is subjective by nature and another agent may well feel differently. I wish you the best of luck with that.

I realise now how lucky I was to get some personalised feedback. The landscape of publishing has changed a lot and it can be rare now to get any response.

The most disappointing knock-back was a rejection from an agent I met face to face at a York Writing Festival who was so excited when she read my first three chapters, and was so lovely in person. The type of agent I would have been happy to work with! Interestingly I really didn’t gel with a different agent at my other 1:1 and she suggested quite a graphic, dramatic change to part of my opening which made me feel uncomfortable. This experience showed me the importance of finding the right agent or publisher. Someone you connect with, and who understands your story.

This was the rejection email from the excited agent (I had to wait over 6 months for this, and it felt like a loooong wait):

As you know, I was really excited by your novel when we met in York, and I very much enjoyed reading the complete manuscript. It’s stayed with me and I’ve been ruminating on it since. The premise to the novel is really interesting and I think you write very well for this market. I love sister/twin stories too! I do think there is a lot of potential here, but I’m afraid I don’t think, at the moment, this stands out in what is a crowded market. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but do bear in mind that another agent may feel differently.

I was gutted to get such a positive rejection.

I kept going.

A BIG publisher were doing a call-out for a new teen digital-only imprint, and wanted the full manuscript emailed.

I received this exciting response from one of their editors: Thank you for sending Follow Me to xx for our consideration. I enjoyed reading it and think that your accessible voice matched with the dark and emotional subject matter makes it well suited to the list. …..  (The email then contained some editorial suggestions)…Of course we would discuss all of this later should we decide to acquire Follow Me but I just wanted to check with you before I share the script with the rest of the team whether Follow Me is still available for publication and if you would be open to editorial suggestions such as those I’ve mentioned.

I responded positively. A month later I got this response:

I just wanted to let you know that because it’s been so hectic here, I haven’t taken Follow Me to our acquisitions meeting yet, but I hope to do so next Wednesday and so I should have a decision for your shortly after that.

Then… SILENCE.  Six months later, still nothing.

Around this time I met a different publisher, who ended up taking Follow Me, at a networking event. I nearly didn’t speak to him, because I had already submitted Follow Me to them via their website submission process, but he said he didn’t remember reading it, they’d had server issues, so to email through the whole manuscript.

I emailed the big publishing house to let them know a Scottish publisher had shown interest, and another editor got back to me apologising saying the first editor had gone on maternity leave. She asked me to keep her posted on what happened, and she would read my submission again. Because I was offered print publication (and because the big house had just kept me hanging) I accepted the offer from the Scottish publisher. I had received an email from the Scottish publisher one night saying they had finished reading Follow Me and asked to meet me. Because of the ‘nearly there moments I’d had already’, I still wouldn’t let myself believe it was going to be positive news. But it  was at the face to face meeting I received an offer for publication.

It was fast-moving from there. The meeting took place at the start of April, with a publication date set for October the same year (this is very rare). It was a whirlwind which led to lots of doors opening for me in terms of opportunities to do talks and workshops in schools and in the community. I’ll talk more about those another time. The rollercoaster of ups AND downs continued, something I don’t think many people prepare you for, when you reach the goal of publication.

And sadly, with my second book I found myself back out on submission. I’ll focus on parts of that story in post 2.

I’ll leave you with some things I learned along the way from the first part of this journey:

My tips:

Spend time preparing your submission. Perfect your synopsis and intro email, along with the sample chapters. Follow the submission rules (you’re doing yourself and your book a disservice if you can’t take the time to read these properly and get them right).

If an agent, editor, or publisher takes the time to give you feedback, know that this means they really do see potential in your work and if the feedback contains constructive criticism, take time to reflect and take on board what they say

If you’re pitching to agents and you have the opportunity to pitch to them in person (to allow a face to face conversation) take it! A five minute conversation can tell you so much about the other person, and a two-way conversation allows you to see if they are on the same wavelength about your book

If you’ve spent time perfecting your craft, your book is well-written and enticing, your success now is going to rely a lot on being in the right place at the right time, connecting with the right agent/publisher, and persistence

Related to this: make the most of any writing related networking events you are invited to. Sometimes introductions to the right people means you are noticed and remembered when submitting/pitching

Don’t send your book out to one agent at a time. Any agent who says they want an exclusive read is worth avoiding (unless you’ve made some sort of personal connection with them, but even then I would say no- you’ll find out why in my next blog post). They can take six months, or more, to get back to you (IF AT ALL – the ghosting is real). A lot of very successful authors have had their manuscripts rejected 20 + times, so do your maths on that one. if they were sending them out one at a time, waiting months for responses

Forge friendships with creatives who understand the pain of the ups and downs of this journey. If you detect jealousy and negativity try to spend more time with people who lift you up. Trust me, at ALL times in this weird creative world, even when folk think you are doing well, you need to surround yourself with positive people

And to help us all keep the faith, some famous rejections:

Lisa Genova, Still Alice: about 100 rejections (or non-replies) from agents (info from Lithub.com)

After getting very little positive feedback, Genova opted to self-publish her book. Eventually, it was acquired and re-issued by Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, and proceeded to spend 40 weeks on the New York Times best seller list, and was made into a film.

Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler’s Wife: 25 rejections from agents.

After getting rejected by 25 agents, Niffenegger sent the book directly to a small San Francisco publisher, where an editor discovered and loved it. It became a best seller and was also made into a film.

One of my favourite books of recent years was Lessons in Chemistry. Here’s an interview with author Bonnie Garmus at Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper (you can read the full interview here https://www.mariashriversundaypaper.com/bonnie-garmus-lessons-in-chemistry/) – Did you indeed receive 98 rejections before Lessons in Chemistry?

“Yes! And they were all from agents. What happened was I had written a novel that was approximately 700 pages…Finally, agent number 98 said that she would read part of it…She wrote back the next day and said, ‘You write well, but you don’t understand this industry…’ The email was pretty nasty, but it was also a very big help. She said, ‘No one’s going to look at a debut author’s 700-page novel—ever. Do yourself a favor and write a novel of appropriate length, and you can send me that when you finish’—which I never did. But that all turned into Lessons in Chemistry. I started completely new. “

Reading these stats makes me realise I’ve never been this persistent. Talent, persistence and resilience. These are the magic ingredients.

Make Every Word Count (blog post 7 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell
Unsplash Image by Sixteen Miles Out

Today’s post focuses on Flash Fiction, and how it might help you develop your writing. I started experimenting with Flash Fiction when I got serious about sending work out to publications. Tackling 100 or 200 word stories felt less daunting in terms of potentially being able to complete something during busy periods of my life. When tackling big projects like writing a novel, there are so many moments where it can be tempting to abandon the project; especially at the ‘sticky middle’ where it can feel like the whole story might never take shape, or even at the start if you can’t quite translate the ideas in your head onto the page and your characters aren’t revealing themselves in the way you’d hoped they might.

With Flash Fiction there’s no space to let your brain slow you down with doubt, as you just need to run with your idea and let the words take shape, with the challenge of still attempting to capture a meaningful ‘moment in time’ that tells some kind of story.

When I was a teenager I loved experimenting with poetry, and for me flash fiction became an extension of that creativity, as I tend to use a lot more imagery in my shorter work. In fact one of the first pieces of work I ever got published was labelled ‘Prose Poetry’, a cross-between poetry and flash fiction. Thanks go to Amy Burns for publishing Performance in her literary journal Spilling Ink (sadly the journal is no longer). Before I started to submit Performance, it won first place in a competition, which gave me the confidence to start sending it out. It was actually accepted for the Herald Saturday story section, but when a year went by without it ever appearing in print I realised the editor had forgotten about me. I was delighted when it then found a home with Spilling Ink. This was my first taste of the rollercoaster of sending work out! You can read Performance in the short story section of my website.

There have been times where I’ve cut longer stories to fit Flash Fiction entry rules, and that in itself can be a really helpful exercise. It starts to highlight unnecessary ‘filler’ words you might use a lot, and can give you more confidence in conveying a meaning or scene without over-explaining it to your reader. It teaches you in real-time how to make every word count.

 I mentioned in an earlier post that learning how to make every word count can help if you are writing pacey, fast-moving novels. If you’re writing a mystery or thriller, or tackling an unsettling topic, you want to keep your reader feeling a bit on edge, and not get bogged down in long over-written passages of narrative which have no purpose. 

If you fancy giving the form a try, check out The Flash Flood Journal It’s a great place to submit flash fiction and join in with a community of writers whose work is posted throughout National Flash Fiction Day. This year National Flash Fiction Day falls on 14 June so that gives you plenty of time to work on a piece (or two). You can read some of my flash fiction which featured in the journal over the years here

I’ll leave you with some tips I shared when I delivered a flash fiction writing workshop at a local writers group.

Top Tips

  • Make every word count – you don’t have much space for backstory and a lot of summarising and don’t get bogged down by unnecessary detail
  • Very important to ‘show’ not tell when working with limited words – show how your character is feeling by their actions and dialogue
  • Get into the action quickly – create intrigue to draw your reader in
  • Create emotion – what mood do you want to create? What do you want your reader to feel? (fear, sadness, hope, humour, romance)
  • Figure out what is at the heart of your story – what message do you want to get across? What are you trying to convey? Getting to the heart of your story helps you make every word count
  • Be creative with strong imagery and symbolism – this can draw the reader in and help you build the mood/setting
  • Still tell a story – have characters (not too many), a setting, something happening and then some kind of resolution
  • Write around a single moment in your protagonist’s day/life – often location will take on a bigger meaning, or perhaps an object
  • Often end with a surprise or impact – if you go for a twist try to avoid a cliché
  • Read some flash fiction to give you an idea of the structure

Inspiration is Everywhere #Part 3 (blog post 6 of series

Posted on by vgemmell

Continuing with the theme of sharing where I find inspiration for stories, today’s post is about the inspiration behind my Young Adult books. I’m cheating a bit with this post and extracting a section from a blog post I wrote back in 2022, where I went into quite a bit of depth already about the inspiration behind my debut YA mystery, Follow Me, and my second YA mystery, Promise Me. You can read the full post ‘Stranger than Fiction’ here

My latest YA Thriller, Young Blood, was also inspired by an article I read in the press, so it fits nicely with the theme of paying attention to what you read in the news. Just like I talked about in last week’s ‘inspiration’ post, the best stories can be formed from things that catch your attention in ‘real- life’, if you add in the ‘What if’ question, and let your imagination run wild…

News headlines often catch my eye and act as a catalyst. When my imagination takes over, and characters start to form, a story of fiction then unfolds, where I imagine what would happen if fictional teenagers were placed in these situations I read about.

Numerous reports of the unexplained Bridgend suicides stayed with me for years .There were twenty-six known suicides in the town between 2007-2008, and most of those who lost their life were young adults. I remembered opening newspapers at the time, wondering what on earth was going on in that town.

In my book Follow Me my 17-year-old protagonist, Kat, begins a desperate search for answers and explanations, after her twin, Abby, is the sixth in their small Scottish town to die by apparent suicide.

A big theme of my YA mystery, Promise Me, is the way in which press coverage and social media has the power to portray a certain narrative during high profile, emotional murder cases. One of the inspirations of the story was my memory of the sensationalist press coverage of convicted Scottish teen Luke Mitchell from many years ago. From 2003-2005 there was lots of press coverage around his case. Demonising language and character assassination was often used in reporters’ narratives (With headlines like ‘Devils Spawn’ appearing on front page reports).

The headline ‘Boyfriend, 15, charged (with murder of schoolgirl Jodi Jones)’, was published in the Edinburgh Evening News, (2004) before said boyfriend (Luke) even went to trial. Everyone in their small-knit town knew he was ‘the boyfriend’.

The paper took things a stop further and named him. The Press and Journal, Aberdeen, also ran a similar story. They faced contempt charges but were cleared of breaching the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act, that states “no newspaper report of any proceeding in court should identify anyone under the age of 16.” (In Scotland this is now 18). They were cleared of charges because judges ruled that the story was not a report of court proceedings. This is just one troubling example of how a fifteen-year-old boy, (and throughout his trial when he was sixteen), dominated headlines. Numerous false ‘facts’ were published about the case, and tabloids delighted in running sensationalist reports about Mitchell’s apparent obsession with knives, drug-taking, lack of discipline in a single parent household, even linking his music tastes to the murder.

I read a lot about the case and it made me realise how easy it could be for a small community to spread rumours relying heavily on hearsay and perceptions of a local outcast boy’s ‘reputation’, and how this could influence local prosecution investigations, and a jury. Conversations I’ve had with legal people where I questioned how anyone could truly be impartial in such a high profile case said a judge would have ensured jurors had no local connections to the case. The trial took place in Edinburgh, less than half an hour away from where the murder took place. I was reading newspaper stories an hour away from where it all unfolded and still felt emotional reactions to the reports, even if I didn’t personally know anyone.

My book Promise Me is a work of fiction, set in an affluent fictionalised Scottish village, and not about the Mitchell case, but I hope it makes people think about how damaging media and indeed, court narratives can be, and the distorted perceptions that communities can sometimes have of young people who don’t quite ‘fit’. In my job I’ve undergone unconscious bias training and I really believe the police involved in this case let a lot of their own unconscious bias (and media pressure to get a conviction), influence their decision-making. If you have an interest in finding out more about this case I recommend the brilliant podcast Through the Wall by Naomi Channell.

My latest YA thriller, Young Blood, is a story about young people in the care system who are kidnapped and taken to a secret house to become exclusive plasma donors for an elite group of wealthy adults who want to stay youthful and healthy. It’s told from the perspective of two teenagers – Ana who is outside the house and dealing with the realisation her mum may have early onset dementia; and Hope who is captured and taken to the house.

Young Blood was inspired by an article I read about an American start-up company ‘Ambrosia’, founded by a medical school graduate in 2016 which sold ‘young blood transfusions’ (from young people into older people). Charging a large sum of money for these transfusions, they claimed a range of health benefits such as treatment for Alzheimer’s. In a pitch about Ambrosia at a self-enhancement conference in 2017 Karmazin said, “We’re a company interested in making you young again.” In my day job I work with vulnerable teenagers. I see how much instability and uncertainty young people in the care system in particular can face. This sparked off the idea of having a powerful doctor set up a premium club who can access pure plasma transfusions from a select group of young people who are easy to make ‘disappear’, whilst maintaining a super-controlled environment within ‘the house.’

Links to buy my Young Adult books are here

I often take along strange news headlines to creative writing workshops I deliver in schools and get the class to choose one as inspiration for a story. A popular headline lots of pupils chose last year was, ‘Girl discovers criminal living in her attic.’ I love hearing the ideas form, and characters that start to develop. It also shows that we can all start with a similar idea, but when you create your own unique characters a truly unique story also starts to take shape…

Why not spend the week looking up interesting headlines, and see if it sparks off any great story ideas!

Inspiration is Everywhere Part 2# (blog post 5 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell
An old observation diary

Today’s post is a continuation from last week where I shared some creative exercises that have helped me understand that when it comes to writing, and creating, you can find inspiration in the everyday ~ if you pay enough attention, stay curious, and let your imagination run wild!

When I deliver creative writing workshops I encourage participants to think of fun ways they can experiment with their writing. Often writers can put a lot of pressure on themselves, especially if working to deadlines, or expectations. It can also be daunting if you think a story should contain ‘complicated’ words or be a certain length.

I find a good way to take the pressure off, and to stop over-thinking, is to engage in writing tasks which don’t require a lot of words, and in fact make you start to look at words in a completely different way.

A challenge I took part in years ago, (just for fun, with friends), was to try and write stories composed of only three letter words (which then extended out to write stories with four letter words, five letter words – you get the idea!).

I amazed myself with being able to write not one, but quite a few, very short stories composed of three letter words. I’m sharing one of them below, which turned into a bit of a philosophical story.

3 Letter Word Story Example

Pat Woo and the Sun


One day Pat Woo saw the sun dip and tip out the sky. 
”Wow! See the sun!”

Pat Woo saw the sun run and Pat ran too. The sun set off for the day. One sun ray hit the ill cow. Pat saw the cow fly – set out for the sky. 

“Moo! Pat Woo! The cow can fly!”

Pat Woo saw the sun run and dip. Its ray hit the old rat. The old rat was lit. The rat got fit – saw the sky; his old eye now new. The rat saw the sun; saw Pat Woo.

“Pat Woo! The rat can see!”

One ray hit the cod. Pat Woo saw its fin dip; saw the cod nod and the cod got out the sea net.

“Pat Woo! The cod will not die!”
”Hot sun you are ace.” Pat Woo had joy for the sun. 

The sun had fun. Pat Woo did too – the day Pat Woo saw the sun dip and tip out the sky.

Why don’t you give this a go yourself? If you’re part of a creative writing group, it might a fun warm-up task to try to wake up the creative side of your brain.

As an extension of last week’s ‘Small Stones’ exercise, I’m going to challenge you to keep a more general ‘observation diary’. This can take the form of visual notes such as photographs, or scribbles (or notes in your phone), of interesting things you notice during your day-to-day. The Small Stones were quite creative paragraphs or lines, but in an observation diary you might want to capture musings and reflections on things in the news, things you overhear etc, anything really which you think one day could form part of a story.

Take a Photograph a Day

Was this a real girl?
Why is there a shoe in the cage with the skeleton?

I’m a very visual writer and I love taking photographs. You can start to build a ‘photographic’ observation diary by taking at least one interesting photograph every day. This could be anything which catches your attention; an abandoned shoe lying at the side of the road, an interesting sculpture you walk past every day, a strange doll in the window of a shop… You can start thinking about the story behind the image there and then, but often it might take a while for a proper idea to form. And that’s fine. Because now you’ve stored the photograph somewhere on your phone, you can return to this later. You might even want to combine the small stones tasks (see the post here for examples), with your photographs.

I’ve shared some photographs above I took when on various trips across the years, which I then later turned into short stories.

The heart photograph was a print which hung in the staircase of a Paris hotel I stayed in during my first solo trip abroad. I spent three nights in Paris and enjoyed wandering the streets alone, and it was during this time, passing by this print every day, I started to form the idea for a short story ‘Only You’ where a jilted bride spends her honeymoon alone in Paris. The story was runner-up in a competition, and broadcast on Hospital Radio. They sent me a CD recording of an actor reading it aloud, which was quite special. I loved hearing my words come to life.

If you enjoy finding inspiration from photographs check out the Scottish Book Trust 50 word story competition here They provide monthly photographic prompts

Listen to conversations

When I say listen to conversations, I mean within reason, as obviously it’s a bit rude to invade others’ privacy. But if you’re on a train or bus where your fellow passengers insist on talking loudly to one another (or on their phone), then naturally you will probably pick up interesting snippets of conversations throughout your day.

In an old ‘observation diary’ (where I used to write down thoughts that randomly popped into my head, interesting facts or stories I came across on social media or in the news, as well as overheard conversations) I found these snippets:

A man and a woman in conversation: “Tommy, you’re being really unfair. You’re stopping me from going to Hollywood. You’re being really bad to me with the brain transplant thing. I know I’ve had at least four brain transplants behind my back.” On the surface, most passengers would dismiss this woman as talking nonsense. But what if the man she is with is a mad scientist, and she’s the subject of numerous experiments, and is starting to rebel?

A teenage girl was sitting behind me on one train journey, talking loudly into her phone, “She fell out with me when I was camping because she said I never texted, but I couldn’t text because seriously I didn’t have reception… and then I ended up sitting with her all night on a night out so she never felt left out… I hate falling out with people, the thought of someone hating me, or having a problem with me…” At this point a boy nearby asks me if I’ve got a pen. He then returns to his seat to scribble something on a bit of paper and when he gets up at his stop he chucks a note at the girl before walking off.

The girl then shrieks into her phone, telling the person on the other end, “Oh my f-ing God. A guy just threw a note at me on the way off his train. Wait, wait. His name is Ryan. I swear… wait… he must have been listening to my conversation. How rude, haha.” (Newsflash girl, I think we’re all now listening)… “He’s said, You are too beautiful to have friends who are mean to you. Add me to facebook and let me make you smile.”

Now depending how your writer brain works, this could either be the start of a romantic novel or a true-crime type stalker thriller….

Next time I’ll be writing more about the inspiration behind my books.

Happy writing!

Inspiration is everywhere #Part 1 (blog post 4 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell
Booklet made by Rebecca Johnstone (aka Dainty Dora)

I’ve been out of action the past week with a horrible flu, hence the bigger gap between posts. This is the first day I’ve felt like attempting to get any words down on the page. I hope you’ve all had a more productive February.

The past couple of blog posts were about learning your craft, and today I’m moving on to talk about Inspiration. I’m going to focus on this theme across a number of posts as I’ve got lots of tips and tasks I want to share with you.

Where do writers get their inspiration? It’s an interesting question, as often ideas will pop in to my head and I’m not exactly sure where they’ve come from. More often than not, something I have heard, seen, or read about, in real life will spark off ideas.

In the past I have enjoyed delivering creative writing workshops around the concept that ‘Inspiration is Everywhere’. Everyday observations have definitely fuelled my creativity and provided lots of inspiration for short stories and flash fiction.

I’ll do a separate post focusing on what inspired ideas in my books as they all connect to real-life stories in the news, and headlines. (Another great task I have used in workshops – picking random bizarre headlines and allowing pupils to then come up with their own story that aligns to them).

Today I’m going to focus on a couple of tasks you can engage in every day that can hopefully help you feel creative.

Task 1 ~ Small Stones

Many years ago I was made aware of the ‘Small Stones challenge’ which showed me how much detail you can see in every day observations if you look closely enough. The idea behind the Small Stones challenge is to:

  • Notice one thing each day
  • Give your whole awareness to it
  • Write it down

My creative friend Rebecca, aka Dainty Dora, (see her substack here), made me a lovely little Small Stones booklet for me to capture notes in which you can see at the top of this post. It’s been a while since I’ve done this exercise, but I dug out some past examples of my ‘small stones’ so I could share them below. I think it’s a great way of generating ideas and starting to form characters.

Some of my Small Stones examples:

Red Glove: child sized, waving hello from a puddle on a dark January morning. The puddles pulled her under and this is a sign -Help, come and find me…

Girl in stilettos, walking comfortably in new shoes, head held high. Her friends are running alongside still trying to catch up with who they are.

Wooden heart laced with fake red berries, tied to a fence. A cheap remembrance of a love so rich. 

Pink hair, pink trainers, black nails and fierce eyes. Sweet and sour: Do not underestimate my power.

A teenage boy, vulnerable face, dark shadows under nervous eyes, a sigh of relief flooding his body as he walks into the comfort of a group who understand: with no questions, no judgement. They speak his language of technological puzzles, navigating night monsters into oblivion, so he can live another victorious day.

When I lived in Paisley, I always noticed interesting characters and one old man stuck in my head in particular. I used to see him wheeling an empty wheelchair down the high street, walking past the market stalls. A foreign accordion player, who often sat outside the M&S, provided a haunting melody to accompany his steps, which echoed down the street. Around this time I took a regular note of small stones observations, one of which was a tangerine peel on the ground shaped like a heart: Heart shaped tangerine peel abandoned on the top step. Layers peeled back, the best bit consumed, now the rest…left to rot.

A combination of all of these observations formed a flash fiction story titled ‘Ghosts’, which was first published in the Grind Journal back in 2014. You can read Ghosts here, on my new short story page on the site.

I always say to young people in my workshops, if they notice something interesting, add in the ‘What if?’ question. This is where your writers’ curiosity and imagination clicks in. After spotting the old man a few times, always pushing the empty wheelchair, I started to ask myself the question; What if he lost his wife, and isn’t quite ready to let go? As soon as I asked myself this question, Ghosts took shape.

Task 2 ~ Participate in Creative Projects or Challenges

Many years ago I engaged in a couple of fun tasks through an American arthouse company called Art House Co-op. I took part in their Sketchbook Project where I filled a blank book with writing, photographs and drawings and posted it back to the Brooklyn Art Library to go on a ‘travelling library tour’ across America. When I was on a trip to New York in 2013 I visited the original art library and viewed lots of other participants’ sketchbooks. Unfortunately after a fire struck in their new location, lots of sketchbooks were lost, then the project shut down. It was a fun task to participate in and I enjoyed illustrating some of my Flash Fiction stories and even wrote some poetry for the first time in years (see one below, with my illustration).

That year the Art House Co-op launched a ‘Sunday swap’ project, asking for participants to compose a list of 50 tasks for a stranger to complete. I posted my list to the company and they then mailed it out to someone, somewhere, and I then received my 50 things from a stranger, in return. I’ve put a photograph of some of my tasks above.

One particular task that really sparked off some creative ideas was the instruction to, ‘Research Natural Phenomenons.’ A natural phenomenon is basically something which occurs in nature, which is not man made. This led to lots of interesting research around things such as Tree Spiders, The Taos Hum, and the Migration of the Monarch Butterfly. Monarch Butterflies are unable to survive the colder winters in North America, so migrate to warmer climates in Central Mexico. Millions of the butterflies cluster together on trees. I enjoyed watching Youtube videos of the butterflies together in the forest and it inspired me to write a poem titled ‘Flight of the Butterfly’, which won third place in the Scottish Association of Writers poetry competition back in 2014. Years later I transformed my poem into a Flash Fiction story, using the same title and theme. This was published in the Glittery Literary Anthology in 2017. You can read ‘Flight of the Butterfly’ here

Why don’t you use some of the tasks from my photo, or do a ’50 Things’ swap with a friend? It’s a great way of getting out of your comfort zone, and doing new things, both of which are really important to keep your creative juices flowing.

A task I took part in during November 2023 was to write a blog post every day, using 30 creative prompts. See my first post here. It was an alternative to NaNoWrimo (National Novel Writing Month), where writers commit to getting a certain number of words down per day, with the aim to accumulate 50,000 words of a novel by the end of the month. I don’t think I quite achieved 50,000 words through my blog posts, but it did spark off a good few short story ideas, with one complete flash fiction piece. Feel free to use the 30 prompts from my original post as a creative challenge.

Next time I’ll continue on the theme of Inspiration, sharing some more tasks and challenges to help kickstart your creativity

Learn your craft (blog post 2 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell

In my last post I mentioned that a big part of my writing life has consisted of attending writing conferences, groups, talks, and workshops. Over the years I absorbed hints and tips and learned a lot about ‘the rules of writing.’

If you are serious about getting published, or sending your work out into the world, my advice to you is to take your time perfecting your craft.

You don’t always have to know what you’re doing for a good story to take shape as I think natural talent and instinct have a big part to play when letting a story unfold. But it can all get a bit messy if you don’t have a fundamental knowledge of the rules which lie beneath it all; like structure, pacing, dialogue, and character development. If you develop confidence in all of these areas I firmly believe this will help you actually complete that book you maybe keep starting, and never quite finish.

If you want to start submitting stories to journals, magazines, competitions, or books to agents and publishers, then you also have to pay attention to submission formatting rules and perfect your grammar. This is where structured writing groups in particular can be really helpful as there’s usually a good mix of experienced writers in attendance who will happily share their knowledge.

To prepare this post I looked through old USB sticks (tip: if you encrypt your USBs make sure you know where you’re saved the passwords!!), emails and notebooks, looking for advice I had noted down from experienced writers over the years. Here’s some highlights I want to share with you:

Structure and Pace:

Alexandra Sokoloff delivered one of the best workshops I’ve ever attended at the Scottish Association of Writers Conference back in 2015. Before writing novels, she wrote for the screen, and gave us an insight into her ‘Screenwriting Tricks for Authors’ which you can read about fully in her book and you can see a summary outline on her website/blog: Alexandra Sokoloff | Bestselling Author. I loved the way she showed us how our novels could be aligned to a three-act screenplay type structure, highlighting in particular the importance of climaxes throughout to keep readers turning the pages, and ramp up tension/conflict.

A summary of Act 1 (this is on her website so not giving away too much here): Meet the character, show the reader their ordinary world, give hints of their inner/outer desire, give them a problem and a call to adventure, and then add in a climax. She then went on to describe the components of Act 1 and 2.


At the York Writers Festival back in 2013 Julie Cohen delivered a fantastic workshop on the importance of pace:

  • To keep a novel going you need conflict
  • You need to create atmosphere, emotion and show character development
  • Nothing should be wasted; each scene should have two or more purposes
  • Functions (purposes) = Move the Plot forward, Move the Subplot forward
  • Similar to Alexandra’s workshop she mentions Conflict as Hooks – end each scene/chapter with a hook so your reader doesn’t want to put the book down

Emotion:
During workshops on Characters’ emotions- A tip: Sometimes we tend to stick in the safe ‘middle ground’, not going deep enough

Dialogue – use it to reveal more about your character. The way characters talk to one another can tell you a lot about their relationship and how they feel in situations.

Tips on all key things from an agent:
Julia Churchill, one of the biggest UK Children’s Book agents offered Twitter followers the chance to join an hour long zoom workshop (This was back in 2022 when Twitter existed and was a useful platform for writers!) I also heard Julia talk on a panel at the York Writers Festival and she sounded very professional and knowledgeable. She was one of the first agents to request a full read of my YA mystery Follow Me, but decided ultimately it was too dark for her.

  • Characters: A good character needs to come to life.  What do they want and why? And how do they achieve this? Give them a dilemma – a huge stakes thing. What is at stake? Think through the stakes of your story. It needs to have clarity. Character really matters to invest the reader. Think about your favourite character – what makes them special? She gave as an example Charlie, in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – it was his integrity that mattered.
  • Setting – Think about incredible, vivid, sense of place settings. Setting can add a lot to the story.  
  • Theme – You want to leave the reader with something. A feeling. A message. She gave examples of books which had at the heart ‘being true to oneself’
  • Voice – This plays into a part of you at whatever age the book is targeted at. As a nine-year-old – the sense of magic, warmth, and adventure you want to feel. Teens – takes you back to sense of angst etc. Agents are always looking for authors with a ‘voice’  

Show, Don’t Tell

What does it mean? I talked about this at a workshop with Greenock Writers last year.

If you do too much ‘telling’ in a story it can slow it down, and keep the reader too removed from the action/emotion. ‘Showing’ helps your story come alive. A mix of showing and telling is okay but you need to engage the reader and help them see the story unfold in some way.

Some examples: (From Reedsy and the Writing Pro)

Telling: Michael was afraid of the dark.

Showing: As his mother switched off the light and left the room, Michael tensed. He huddled under the covers, gripped the sheets, and held his breath as the wind brushed past the curtain. 

Telling: When Mary failed her test, she was embarrassed.

Showing: When Mary saw the big red F on her work, her cheeks flushed. She crumpled the test and hid it in her desk, hoping no one noticed.

Telling: The forest is scary.

Showing: The forest is full of staring eyes. The branches look like gnarled hands, reaching out to grab me. Leaves crunch under my feet as I try to find my way home. The air smells like mildew and decay.

My tip:

Read lots, and read widely. You can learn a lot about the craft of writing simply by reading a well-written book or story. Pay attention to the structure, pacing, characters. Why do you love it? Why do you want to keep reading?

Find writers who have broken the rules; books with weird punctuation and strange structures, because once you develop confidence, you can then break the rules and be a bit experimental and creative with your style. When I read Jack Kerouac’s On the Road in my twenties, I found it quite difficult to read but I liked that his stream of consciousness style, with erratic punctuation, was carefree and raw, and it made me realise I was being too ‘self-conscious’ in my writing.

If I am too conscious of trying to write a story, it’s not working. It’s not until I have that feeling of being lost in the story and letting the characters and a subconscious part of my brain take over that I know things are clicking into place.

So follow the rules, learn your craft, but then let go, and just write!

SAW conference photos

On my next post I’ll share some favourite books which focus on Learning your Craft

#

Starting Out (blog post 1 of series)

Posted on by vgemmell

Following on from my post last week this is the first of a series of blogs which delve a bit deeper into what the writing life has been like for me over the years. When I say ‘writing life’ it’s important to emphasise you can be living a writing life without sharing your words, or ever reaching publication.

My love for writing started with a love for reading and as a family we made regular visits to our local library, which at the time was in Inverclyde. My house was always bursting with books growing up and this was thanks to my Mum’s enthusiasm and passion for words. I realised some of my early favourites, such as the Nancy Drew series and Point Horror, have shaped a lot of my writing. All three of my Young Adult books (see here), feature teen sleuths who undercover the truth about some dark mysteries taking place in their Scottish villages.

I wanted this post to be a bit of an overview of what has been important to me over the years. Finding champions (people who encourage, and don’t dismiss your ideas and dreams), and attending writing focused groups/workshops/conferences to learn my craft, have been so important.

Through both, I’ve been supported to bring my stories to life, and found like-minded people to advise and steer me on my way. Being connected to others writers/creatives has kept me motivated and enthusiastic during times I have asked myself why do I devote so much time to this? What’s the point?

For me, writing truly feels like it is in my blood. Even if I take a break from time to time, (or nearly ‘give up’), something always calls from deep down inside me that makes me sit back down at my laptop or notebook (or notes page on a phone!) to shape words into some form of storytelling.

Here’s some key highlights along the way: See links at the bottom of the blog post to help you find groups/courses

  • My Mum has always been an important champion, always encouraging me to keep writing, and submit my work. When I was eleven my Mum took me along to a new writing group she was attending (Erskine Writers).This introduced me to a magical world of writers, and I realised people actually did this writing thing as a job, or at least submitted stories to magazines/competitions and books to actual publishers…and got their work in print. Over the years Erskine Writers has played a massive part in my development as a writer. It’s where I won my first writing competition and started to read out my work aloud to strangers for the first time, and get critiques from people other than my mum. It helped me develop confidence and taught me the importance of listening to feedback to improve my craft
  • When I was in primary seven my older brother indulged me by reading my illustrated Horror novella – Ye olde Castle. Sadly I never kept this notebook, probably too embarrassed by the illustrations of heads rolling down a hill during the unfortunate school trip. My head teacher at the time called me to her office, (not to give me a mental health assessment thankfully.) She encouraged me to keep writing, and showed me a book that a twelve-year-old girl had published (it was about a vegetable family, and I remember being very impressed!). I continued writing many stories during this time – the photo at the top of the blog post is a notebook that did survive. Twenty- odd years later when my first book Follow Me was launched at Waterstones my head teacher attended my launch night and I was able to thank her for her encouragement during my acknowledgements. One of many full circle moments I’ve had in my writing life
  • Another teacher champion: My first year English teacher Mrs Cook told me I was going to be the next Roald Dahl (not quite happened, but this meant a lot at the time as I had grown up loving these books!) and got my class involved in acting out (and I am sure filming!) a play I had written in my own time
  • When I was about twelve or thirteen I finished my first ‘book’ Rhea the Rollerskater and my mum helped me package it and send it off to a publisher. They sent me a very lovely rejection. I love the fact my mum encouraged the process, and the publisher was encouraging, but I think I knew I really needed to give myself a bit more time to develop my craft! And also have some fun along the way. Being too focused on publication can detract from just enjoying the process.
  • When I was seventeen my mum took me along to my first Scottish Association of Writers conference. I was delighted to witness her being presented with a first prize certificate for her short story (from Ian Rankin!) This was a weekend where I first entered a world filled with experienced authors/writers and attended workshops which taught me lots about the craft of writing and storytelling. Twenty years later I was invited to be an adjudicator at the conference. Another full circle moment in my writing life!
  • In my twenties I started getting serious about sending work out and during my early thirties in particular I was on a mission to get my work in print. I felt at this point I had developed my craft enough to write an acceptable short story that could maybe see print. I’ll do a separate post on early submissions/rejections/acceptances and how to approach this
  • Around this time I kept attending the Scottish Association of Writers, as well as attending a brilliant writing festival (that an author at SAW suggested I go to) in York. Sadly this festival no longer runs but I’ve put alternative suggestions in the links below. It was here I met face-to-face with agents for the first time to pitch my novel. What this taught me is a website can tell you only so much about an agent. Meeting them in person allowed me to see how we ‘clicked’ as well as showing me how one totally understood my story, whereas the other did not!
  • Writing friendships ~ I met some of my best friends through writing groups and at a writing networking group. Finding people who are on the same wavelength and who understand the pain and enjoyment writing can bring, as well as being a safe space to share work and your highs and lows, has been such an important part of ‘keeping going’.
  • When my debut YA novel came out I was clueless really about how anything worked in terms of how to organise talks, school events and so on. I’ll do other posts about this, but at the time joining the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) and attending their conference and speaking to published authors was so helpful. Fellow published authors who invited me to, and suggested me for, small festivals/talks was so amazing and helped me a lot. Librarians were also so supportive. Signing up to the Scottish Book Trust Live Literature database has helped me secure writing talks/workshops throughout the years (and get paid for them!)

As I live in Scotland I’ve included some Scottish/UK focused links below to help you find your tribe. Happy writing!

Find a Writing Group:

These lists can help you get started: https://www.scottishbooktrust.com/writing-and-authors/writing-groups-in-scotland

https://www.scottishassociationofwriters.com/find-a-writing-group/

Use social media to help you find local groups. I found an informal Glasgow Writers meet up group via facebook

Ask your local library and community centres. Paisley central library host a local group.

Attend Conferences/Writing Festivals/Courses

https://www.scottishassociationofwriters.com/saw-conference-2025/

https://www.cymerafestival.co.uk/2024-writers-conference-programme

https://www.writersandartists.co.uk/events-and-courses

Check college websites for leisure writing courses/online writing courses. This is a great way to connect with other writers. West College Scotland started an online creative writing course in November. I’ve also seen authors I know sharing courses they are running via Dundee Lifelong Learning

Attend a Retreat:

A popular one with writer friends: https://www.moniackmhor.org.uk/courses/

One I’ve got my eye on: https://www.acornwritingretreats.com/

Wintering

Posted on by vgemmell

A quote caught my attention recently on LinkedIn where a writer referenced Laura Strom (who is part of a Regenerative Leadership group) where she described ‘Wintering’ : ‘Wintering and resting are timeless practices that invite us to slow down, reconnect with inner nature, and tap into the depths of our creative cauldron. In a world that glorifies constant productivity and ceaseless activity, intentional rest becomes an act of rebellion, a means to disrupt the status quo. It is through rest that we challenge the notion that our worth is solely defined by our achievements and productivity.’ I’m aware author Katherine May has also penned a book called Wintering (which I’ve never read, have you? ) and I suspect from reading the blurb, it will follow a similar philosophy to the quote above.

As soon as we hit Autumn, and the days shorten, my body goes into a bit of hibernation mode. After I launched my latest book in August my automatic thoughts turned to ‘hurry up and get on with the next project’ but this is the first time for a while I have yet to actually start the next project and I’m giving myself permission to take a bit of a break. I have plenty of ideas zooming around my head which are often making it onto paper in scribbled note form. The ideas form two very different projects, which I think is a big reason why I am stalling as I can’t decide which to focus on and get on with! But I also do feel like I need a bit of a break.

I’m tired of logging into social media and wondering what to post. And I also haven’t posted on here in a while. I’ve got a day off today so decided it was time to log in to get some words down! I get so much fatigue from talking to people all day long in my day job I just crave a bit of silence sometimes from words and thoughts and often shy away from updating my social media feeds because I can’t even begin to think about how to be ‘engaging’. I’m sure I’m not alone in this, but when I see other writers I follow post regularly about all the exciting things they are achieving I always think I should do better.

But then this line from the quote really resonated: ‘challenge the notion that our worth is solely defined by our achievements and productivity’

In the writing world sometimes I think we forget to post about the joy of just creating a wonderful character, or celebrating the days where we have crafted a bewitching line of narrative, or written a scene that suddenly comes together in a seamless way that makes you doubt you even wrote it… Even that sounds like focusing too much on productivity, but it’s the magical feeling of being swept up in words that keeps me returning to projects, or starting new projects, even if I’m feeling a bit tired and fatigued. Because I know how much enjoyment it brings me, when I’m in the middle of writing a book or a story that starts to come alive and almost wants to write itself. And during the days it doesn’t; that’s okay too. The words will always come.

The good thing about the darker evenings is the feeling that it is okay to want to stay indoors and curl up with a good book or good film/TV series and not think about doing too much else. I’ve been on a bit of a reading slump this year so I feel like I need to give myself permission to slow down and enjoy soaking up other peoples’ stories for a while, before I start my next one….

And actually I have been enjoying other peoples’ stories the past few weeks as I was asked to judge a short story competition for Greenock Writers’ group. I’ll be returning there this evening (after doing a talk there back in September). I’m very much looking forward to reading out my results, and hopefully meeting the winners. It was a very welcoming, enthusiastic group and it always reminds me that another aspect of the writing world I really enjoy is meeting up with other writers, and talking about writing!

Happy November, and here’s to giving ourselves permission over the next few months for some ‘Wintering’